Health claims in pet food are unclear

An increasing amount of pet food products with certain health claims
enter the market. However, these claims are often not backed up by scientific
research, according to the Animal Sciences Group (ASG) from Wageningen
University that investigated the health claim situation in commercial pet food.

ASG concluded that the European legislation does not
clearly outline the definitions of diet pet food and medicinal pet food.

Supplements and
ecological and homeopathic pet food is not listed at all. Researchers
found out that many claims in cat and dog food are unclear, not univocal, not
relevant and not scientifically founded.

Follow up
researchASG
also noted that regulation in the pet food and livestock
feed chain is far behind the legislation in the human food chain. ASG therefore
recommends a better tuning of the definitions for diet pet food and medicinal
pet food within the European Union and a follow up study in horse feed and
livestock feed.